Tales from La La Land

Two years ago when Laef and I went to St. Louis we stayed at an Econo Lodge that overlooked the freeway and had a full-length mirror in the shower. It was a smoking room because, well because that’s all it offered. The bed was covered with one sheet – not a fitted sheet, mind you. Just one sheet strewn across the nasty-ass mattress.

Back then, we weren’t married, and we were still paying off credit cards. The fact that we were even staying at a Lodge (I liked to close my eyes and think of it as a snow lodge with walls made of the finest cedar) and not in a tent at O’Fallon Park was a big deal.

So, last week we went to St. Louis again, this time for a wedding. We were fortunate enough to have a room at the Casa Nick Dozier, so we weren’t faced with the dilemma of Econo Lodge round 2. Now, Nick’s shower doesn’t come with a full length mirror (BOO!), and the guest bed appeared to have two for real sheets on it (how classy!), but he did have a gigantic stack of Playboys in his bathroom.

I don’t think I’ve seen Laef’s eyes light up that much since I told him that I would learn how to change a flat tire. (I ordered AAA, which is basically the same thing. Shhh). When we first got to Nick’s house, we were there alone so Laef picked up 8 magazines, walked out of the bathroom and said, “I’m gonna catch up on guy stuff.”

Which was my cue to catch up girl stuff – a 2 hour nap. It was a Thursday afternoon, and normally I’d be chained to my cubicle and, Laef would be stressing about some basketball-related incident, but on this day we were looking at boobies and resting. It was the start of a perfect 4-day vacation.

Later that night, sufficiently rested and boobified, we took a cab to Busch Stadium to watch the Cardinals play. The cabbie ragged on the Cardinals the entire way to the stadium in a way that only a cabbie could rag on the home team, and by the time we got there we were half expecting the Cards to lose by14 runs.

But, this was our vacay! Laef has been talking about going to the Cardinals game for a month. So, of course they were going to win! And they did, 4-0.

On Friday we went to see Nick’s girlfriends band – Killing Vegas – play at Voo Doo lounge in the Harrah’s casino. In case you didn’t already know, girl bass players are super hot. And, Layla did not disappoint. We wandered between the lounge to watch the band, and the casino to play blackjack. I might have called the dealer an asshole once, but it was only because I double downed on an 11 and he gave me a 2. Who does that?

We strolled in at 3 a.m., which meant we didn’t get up until 11 a.m. on the wedding day. I have a completely different perspective of weddings now. Because I know how much work and thought goes into every single thing that happens before, during and after the ceremony. This couple went all out, providing a full open bar, which is very brave. And appreciated.

Also, this is what happens when you have a full bar at a wedding and are drunk by 10:30 p.m.: 7-11. Funyuns. Packaged chicken sandwich that requires microwaving. Frozen pizza. Bad news, people. Bad news. Right now as I’m typing this I am trying to understand why I did not think to get nachos. I am kind of upset that I missed my opportunity. Hopefully there will be another.

We flew home on Sunday. Back to reality. In a sad, boring house that doesn’t have Playboys.

(That I know of)

Back in the day, my brother and I used to play opposite day. Basically the game consisted of saying something that was the opposite of true.

Yes, it got old quick.

Since I had grand plans for this past weekend, none of which included my sweet-ass dustbuster (unless I used it naked, per Laef), I thought I’d recap our super exciting weekend.

The bad news: I did not eat 7-11 Nachos.

The good news: I stayed up past 1 a.m.

On Friday night Laef and I went to our friend Allie and Greg’s for dinner. Allie is pregnant and Greg is an Oregon grad who pretty much only wants to discuss Oregon football. He and Laef also share an affinity for watching Dave Chappelle DVDs, so the night started off with fish tacos and Chappelle show archives. Don’t get me wrong, it’s some funny stuff, but Me+Full Belly+Vodka+Comfy Couch+TV=Sleeping within 5 minutes.

Greg yelled at me every two minutes about how lame I was, so I rallied. It was kind of like when the tennis instructor told me I was lazy. I hit my next forehand as hard as I could and aimed for his balls. Greg telling me I was lame, flipped the switch.

Then we stayed up until 1 a.m. watching Oregon football highlight videos (that sounds a lot lamer than it really is). Laef set a PR for Bud Lites so we walked home arguing about who the best Oregon quarterback of all time is.

TOOLS.

The next morning things were a little fuzzy. But since my tolerance level is that of a 21-year-old slut, I was up and at ‘em by 9 a.m. By 10 a.m., I hadn’t heard a peep from Laef, so I went to check on him.

Me: “Do you want pancakes?”

Laef: “Ugh. No.”

Me: “Coffee?”

Laef: “Not yet.”

Me: “Water?”

Laef: “Ugh.”

And just like that, it was opposite day in our house. I was hoping Laef could rally so we could go to the beach, but for some reason sitting in the blazing sun with a wicked headache was at the bottom of his to-do list.

I will admit that we mopped the floor on Sunday morning, but then we went to the beach and walked around Santa Monica as opposed to sitting at home marveling at how cute Sanch is and how he looks cute on the balcony.

We are making progress people. Making progress.

As in tennis, people!

Geez. You think this is a blog for young people who laugh at words like balls and fart?  Well, it’s not. This is a blog for old people. Like me.

Last week I celebrated another birthday, and inched my way slightly closer to 40. No big thing, really. I even bragged on my Facebook page that I stayed up until 1 a.m. on Friday night celebrating. Then I celebrated all day on Saturday. I was totally patting myself on the back all day Sunday. Feeling like a cool kid after staying up past 9 p.m. TWO NIGHTS IN A ROW!

Apparently, I was feeling so good on Sunday, that Laef and I decided to go play tennis. By play tennis, I mean hit two balls over the giant 50-foot fence within 5 minutes and try as hard as we could to have a rally that reached 5.

This ain’t table tennis, yo.

After a while it became clear that this was the first time Laef had ever played tennis. So, I pretty much dominated him with my sick back hand and my wicked serve (I’m testing him here to see what it will take for him to comment on the blog). He tried to make me run back and forth all over the court, but I just kept yelling, “Marathon, Bitch! I can run all day!”

Nothing will make you feel more youthful than dominating your 20-something husband on the court.

However, everything starting going downhill midway through our tennis “match”. Honestly, we were the youngest people at the courts by at least 70 years. And while we were struggling to rally, these freaking pension-livers were playing like they just swam with alien Cocoon’s. Seriously. It was embarrassing. I mean, the courts are HUGE, the fences around the courts are HUGE, and yet we somehow managed to hit balls onto their court in the middle of their super-intense match time and time again.

So, we are now signed up for tennis lessons, and I shit you not, the age group on the web site says: 18-100. And, I bet there will be some 100-year old there to remind me that, I am in fact, playing a sport that old people can play (and play well).

Later that night, Laef and I went to the movies to see Iron Man 2. Nothing makes me want to stab myself more than sitting in movies with teenagers. I’m thinking that makes me old.

I won’t even tell you how old I felt when I watched the MTV Movie Awards. My favorite part of the night was Sandra Bullock, and she’s well into her 40s. Kristen Stewart is the most awkward person ever, and I have absolutely no idea why anyone would want to put their mouth on Robert Pattinson or Taylor Lautner. But right there in front of my eyes was Tom Cruise and J-Lo doing what they had to do to stay relevant: booty shake it for the kids who weren’t even alive when Top Gun came out. They know that the Twilight generation is running things now, and they wanted to impress them. I sure do miss Jenny from the Block, though.

ANYWAY, I went to bed Sunday still trying to think that I was young and cool.

And then Monday morning BITCH-slapped me.

I am definitely not able to bounce back after so many weekend drinks activities.

For starters, I would like to call bullshit on The Hangover and Swingers. Both of these Vegas-related movies revolve around dudes road-tripping to Vegas. In The Hangover,  said dudes rush back in time for a wedding after spending the weekend in Vegas. In Swingers, the dudes are shown stopping along a desolate highway on their way back to LA.

I am here to let you know that if you drive to Vegas you will not be able to 1) rush back in time for anything and 2) there is nothing desolate about the insane amount of cars jockeying for position on the 2-lane highway between Las Vegas and Los Angeles.

We drove because we weren’t sure if we’d be able to go this weekend until the last minute and flights were not cheap. We decided to suck it up and drive so that we’d have extra money for gambling. While it is awesome that we can hop in the car and go to Vegas on a whim, I vote for flying if at all possible.

Anyway.

We arrived on Friday around 1 p.m. This gave me time to place a few bets on the Friday evening games. I won’t even get into how stressful it is to watch games when you have money riding on it. Nor will I go into just how hard it is to pick games. It’s one thing to pick your bracket. It’s an entirely different thing to navigate the spread.

I can tell you that I made 4 bets for my brother, one for my mom, 2 for a friend in Eugene and 8 different bets for myself. That’s 15 bets on games. I won on 3 tickets. THREE.

Part of it is my fault in that I went ballsy by only betting parlays, meaning that I placed a bet on 3 different teams and all 3 would have to be right for me to win.

Unfortunately, after the Friday games were over I somehow convinced Laef that we should go to the club. Let’s talk about how NOT fun a Vegas club is for a sober married couple. First of all, there’s no way that it wasn’t some kind of fire hazard. Once we got inside we were unable to move. We managed to get a drink and then stood awkardly on the dance floor wondering why we were there.

We left around 2 a.m. and decided to play blackjack. Because there were only $15 tables, Laef went out quickly. I went up about $60 and decided to put all of my money on one hand.

FAIL. Luckily we left our Saturday money in the room.

Before going to bed though, I made my bets for Saturday’s round of basketball games.

We headed to the pool on Saturday morning. The highlight of the trip was my Saturday parlay of Saint Mary’s, Baylor and Kansas State. While at the pool, I watched Saint Mary’s beat Villanova. My parlay was intact (I can’t tell you how fucking annoying and frustrating it is to have the first game of your parlay fail. At that point your ticket is meaningless and you are left watching the games for…fun? No. Not fun, which means you bet more on the games. Sigh.) Later that afternoon, Baylor won so my parlay was now riding on Kansas State.

K State won, I collected my money and per my brother’s recommendation, we went to the fine establishment Ellis Island. There’s no way to really describe it other than to tell you that it’s one block OFF the strip, it’s connected to a Super 8 Motel and it sells $1 hot dogs.

However, they have $5 blackjack and craps. Laef started at the blackjack table with me, but after losing $40 in about 2 minutes he disappeared. About an hour later I became somewhat worried so I did a quick glance around the casino. I saw him high-fiving a random guy in a Michigan shirt at the craps table. At that point I figured things were going well.

We were both up, and despite several beers each, we made the smart decision to walk away and head back home. Between my parlay victory and the success at Ellis Island, Saturday was a lot better than Friday.

However, on Sunday, I decided to do one last parlay with Cornell and Maryland. Thank you to Cornell for following through. And, a big fat F YOU to Maryland for sending me home on a low note.

But, here’s the thing. The bookmakers had Maryland favored by 1 point. The bookmakers know their shit. So even when Maryland was down by as much as 15 points, I figured they’d have to make some kind of run. With about 6 seconds left in the game, Maryland went ahead by ONE POINT. Michigan State and one last shot, and as we all know, the Spartans made it to win. If Michigan State had missed that last shot, Maryland would have won by 1 point despite trailing the entire game. I thought about it the whole way home. The fact that the bookmakers are so spot on is absolutely baffling to me.

Today is Monday and we are back home. I have been trying to figure out a way to get back to Vegas for the games next weekend.

I consider myself a lucky wife.

From time to time, my husband travels for entire weekends at a time and I get to do whatever I want.

Doing whatever I want usually consists of me being able to roam about the house without getting the “sex” eye or the “Let’s watch The  Hurt Locker” statement.

However, over the past couple of weeks, I was in a funk. I can’t pinpoint why, but I think it had to do with a combination of getting back to the grind of traffic and the stress of work after a splendid 2-week break for Christmas. It rained quite a bit in early January so I wasn’t running nearly as much as I usually do.

Not to mention, I noticed that I was sporting a mustache that I swear I never noticed before. Also, my brows were clearly trying to meet in the middle of my forehead in an effort to remind me of the most important part of marriage: Always meet half way.

True.

You gotta meet halfway.

Which is why over the past 5 years I can’t remember a time I went to a spa for a facial or a wax. I have gotten a few massages here and there on special occasions, but basic feminine maintenance?

It’s hard to explain to men that a fucking facial costs upwards of $100. I could barely understand it.

But my face was looking tired and Lindsay Lohan-esque, I was growing hair that I can no longer hide or comb into a pretty shape.

So I deemed this past weekend a “me” weekend.

I woke up on Saturday morning, went on a 6-mile run in great weather, and then headed out for my facial and waxing.

Now I know why facials are so expensive.

It was 60 minutes of bliss.

I felt refreshed.

Which gave me the energy to go to the mall and browse around with nothing to do and nowhere to be.

Then I decided to treat myself to a $3 cupcake. Between facials and cupcakes, I am pretty sure I’m in the WRONG business. The bake shop was packed with people willing to spend $3 on one cupcake. I could have made 12 cupcakes for $3.

I am now thinking that I should open a salon that sells cupcakes. The Bill Gates of pampering, bitches.

Anyway, I sat outside and ate my cupcake, savoring every bite and realizing how happy one little cake can make a person.

After that, I headed home to watch a movie and lay on the couch. I did that until I fell asleep. At 9 p.m.

On Sunday, I ran 10 miles and it felt great. By the time I got back, I was feeling back to normal and out of my funk.

Laef came home around 4 p.m.

His first words: Get Naked.

Good thing I am out of my funk.

Sometimes I am embarrassed for whining about work.

Or whining about anything for that matter.

Because the truth is, my life is pretty solid.

Laef and I went to San Diego to see friends this weekend. I ran the AFC Half Marathon with Natalie and Erin. Laef drank Scotch with Sean on Friday, they went tot he movies on Saturday while Erin and I watched reality TV to make ourselves fall asleep by 9 p.m.

We got to see Ben and Annett for lunch on Sunday.

It was so nice to see people that can make you forget about petty work bullshit and remind you that life is so much bigger than that.

I set a new personal best, finishing the race in 2 hours and 8 minutes. I forgot my iPod, which scared me. I was afraid that my mind would venture off into complete nonsense for 13 miles. The thought of listening to my own jacked up thoughts for 2 hours totally motivated me to run faster.

But, I never really thought about anything except for the race. I was focusing on my pace, how I was feeling, how I knew I could push myself a little bit harder. By mile 10, I knew I could beat my time, and focused solely on ignoring my shins.

Now that I’m back to work, I realize that if I can just take each day as though it were the 11th mile – on a steep hill – and push through without letting my mind go down a dark path, I will be able to press on.

It only took 13 miles, five friends and two fish tacos to realize how good I actually have it.

The weather is finally starting to seem summer-like. There is nothing better than a weekend of sun, chilling at home, drinking Sangria and eating guacamole.

It seems like Laef and I have been all over the place each and every weekend, so I was definitely excited to be home for a change. I had grand plans of doing some major spring cleaning on Saturday, but I sort of realized that I should also take a moment to just finally chill the fuck out and enjoy the day.

We have decided to let the Sanch venture outside a bit. We’re going to limit it to only during the day when we’re home so we can see what he’s up to while roaming free. As cool as I would like to think I am, I spent a big part of the day on Saturday sitting in the back yard watching my cat.

Whatever. I am easily entertained.

Sanch met the neighbor kitty Buddy. Buddy did his absolute best to hiss as loud as possible and try to intimidate The Sanch. But, after being locked inside for the past year, The Sanch did not give a flying fuck about Buddy’s hissing. He was determined to make a friend no matter what.

So, despite Buddy’s meanest noises, The Sanch just kept following him around the yard. Eventually, Buddy gave up, found a spot in the shade and set up camp. The Sanch followed him over and kept a fairly safe distance, but nonetheless, he was hanging with another cat! STOKED. He was probably like, fuck, finally. Someone who gets me.

Then Buddy threw up for some unknown reason and took off. Sanch stayed back to investigate. I was thinking it was some kind of initiation thing where if Sanch ate Buddy’s puke they’d be puke brothers, but Sanch was dainty and buried it.

Later that night, the Detwiler twins rolled into town to celebrate their 27th birthday. We grilled some food, ate some Sprinkles cupcakes and drank yummy summer drinks.

We then decided to visit Beaches to get our dance on.

It is safe to say that it was a success on many levels.

1. Laef Danced.

2. The played Lady GaGa

3. The Twins Were Popular With the Locals

On Sunday morning, my weekend took a somewhat bizarre turn as I was dog-sitting the neighbors dog, who decided to launch an all out attack on another dog while we were on a walk. Let me tell you what is not fun: SCARY DOG FIGHTS. Especially when you are helpless and can only watch as a dog (not yours) basically tries to kill someone elses dog by biting its neck in a furry.

In an effort to end the weekend on more positive note and mellow my nerves, Laef and I spent the afternoon at the beach.

And, all I ever want to be is these people:

Complete and total bliss.

The fact that we lost an hour yesterday made waking up on this particular Monday even worse.

When I woke up on Sunday, I reached over for my phone to see if I had somehow managed to sleep past 8 a.m. (Try as I may, I can not sleep in on the weekends). It used to annoy me that I would be awake so early on a Saturday or a Sunday because ALL week I think about how awesome it is going to be come weekend time.

“I’m going to sleep until NOON!”, I tell myself.

But, I have grown fond of my early-rise hours because it gives me that much more time. Free time for myself. No work. No traffic. No obligations. Last week, I spent a total of about two hours per day awake and not at work. So, waking up early on the weekends just makes my free days longer.

I was disgusted to see that it was 9:30 a.m. when I woke up yesterday! WTF? I have not slept past 9:30 a.m. since Annett came to town and we had about 74 shots of shit.

By the time I got up, went for my run, picked up some groceries, and made breakfast, it was 1 p.m. Normally all of these logistical things are done by 10:30 a.m.

Alas.

We did our usual Sunday stuff and enjoyed the last half our day very much. I watched the season-finale of The L Word to cap off my night. One less show to watch, which I guess is a good thing. Until they spark up a spinoff.

So, this morning, the alarm came about one hour too soon and I’ve got a serious case of the Monday’s multiplied by whoever decided daylight savings time is still a good idea.

First and foremost, I would like to go on record as saying that I want to punch Monday in the face. I am nowhere closer to being rich, although when I walked to AM/PM last night, I wondered what might happen if I held up the clerk and stole all the lottery tickets. Then I realized that I actually prefer sitting at my desk blogging as opposed to sitting in jail with a metal bed.

So, rather than cry in my oatmeal about how fuckity fucked Monday’s are, I figured I’d recap the weekend.

Laef and I went out to dinner on Friday night at China Grill in Manhattan Beach. I can’t remember the last time we ate Chinese food, yet I am constantly reminded of how yummy it is everytime I read Brittany’s blog, Facebook status or Tweet. Anyway, it was a great way to end what was a very long week. There’s something about chicken swimming in lemon and orange, and noodles doused in thick sauce, that makes everything OK. Well, that and Sake.

After dinner, we headed to Ralphs to get a bottle of wine. Now, I was super giddy after drinking Sake, and seeing the following in the middle of Ralphs gave me the giggles. All I can think is that the owner saw the Top Chef where the chefs visited a farm and got to basically pick a live animal in order to have the freshest ingredients. Perhaps Ralphs in Manhattan Beach will soon be carrying cows and chickens.

Anywasted, that was pretty much the highlight of Friday night. If I’m being honest, I am 34 going on 84 as I watched Dateline on a Friday night. There’s no way that people under 84 (except for me) are watching Dateline on Friday.

I pulled myself together and did a nice 8-mile run on Saturday with no pains. I don’t think you realize how fucking boring it is to run for over an hour. I have heard every song on my Ipod about 400 times and so I convinced Laef to cough up $9.95 and let me download a book onto my Ipod. I picked Devil Wears Prada and spent my run realizing that my life mirrors Anne Hathaway’s character in a way I didn’t think was possible. Do you realize I have to RUN to go pee when I’m at work?

We spent Saturday night watching No Reservations, Dateline (fuck, I know) and reruns of Bad Girls Club while eating some delicious Italian Baked Ziti.

On Sunday, the sun came out and we walked around Manhattan Beach before going to Whole Foods to do a quick run through. By quick run through, I mean try all of their samples, which are usually cheese, some kind of cheesy spread with crackers, and some sort of organic juice to wash it all down. We escaped before anyone realized we were grazing and not buying.

After that we went tuxedo shopping and then to the mall. We somehow got separated in the mall, and after searching for Laef for 20 minutes and realizing that I didn’t have my cell phone, I attempted to use a pay phone. Problem No. 1: That shit is 50 cents. I am pretty sure it was 20 cents the last time I used one. Problem No. 2: I have no fucking idea what Laef’s phone number is. Problem No. 3: I had already put the money in when I realized I didn’t know the number and, OF COURSE, the fucking change return thing didn’t work. I am so OVER 1976.

Unsure what to do, I snapped back in to the 2000′s and headed to the Mac store. I quickly sent Laef an email, which I knew he’d get on his phone, and we were reunited.

There was no Dateline on Sunday, but I did fall asleep at 9:30 p.m. in the middle of the L Word, which I am pretty still sure equates to me being old.

In unrelated weekend news, my brother sent me a text photo on Sunday afternoon. Pretty much made my day.

She is clearly spending quality time with her daddy.

It should come as no surprise to anyone that I found my wedding dress at the very first store I went to.

To be fair, it wasn’t the first one I tried on, so I’m kind of proud. I’m not much of an errands person and so when I tried on one that lead to me posing and spinning and smiling for 10 straight minutes, I figured that was the one.

I definitely went over the $300 budget set by Laef. (Thank you mom for making up the difference!). But, as the woman at the shop explained, “the white dresses need more material and lining so that they are not see through.”

And, although I run an adult blog site, I don’t want my wedding XXX.

The only small drawback to the experience was the 16-year old girl who came in with her dad, mom, aunt, uncle, brother, friend and a few other entourage members to pick out a dress for some sort of high school dance. Nothing like having your dad and Uncle Bob roaming around the bridal salon. And, by the way, who gets a $400 dress for prom? My shit went to Jessica McClintock when they had the 90-percent off sale. Anyway, I sort of felt like I was in the middle of an MTV show.

To celebrate the purchase – which has been torture because all I want to do is put it on again and look at it, but will have to wait at least four months to do again – Annett and I went to lunch in Manhattan Beach and pretended we were rich.

On Saturday night, Laef and I went to see Slumbdog Millionaire. Loved it. Very creative concept and interesting characters. We spent the rest of the evening watching scary movies and staying up way too late.

We had grand plans for today, but my first order of business was a 9-mile run. That is by far the longest I’ve done yet, and let’s just say, I spent most of the day napping and resting my legs. Oh, and gorging on insane amounts of Pinkberry, M&Ms, pizza and whatever else was around.

So, now we are about to figure out if we watch 24 live or the Golden Globes. I’m trying to find a wedding hairstyle, so I feel that it is necessary to watch and take notes. Laef does not. I am pretty sure after the reality binge last week, I will lose this battle.

Speaking of my shows. Dear Grey’s Anatomy: I can’t handle the Denny thing.